Sunday, December 4, 2016
Trump rants against China in Twitter outburst
US President-elect Donald Trump has posted a series of tweets criticising China for its monetary policy and its operations in the South China Sea.
"Did China ask us if it was OK to devalue their currency" and "build a massive military complex?" he asked. "I don't think so!"
Last week Mr Trump risked a diplomatic rift with China by speaking directly with Taiwan's president.
The highly unusual move saw China lodge a complaint with the US.
The US has previously criticised China's yuan devaluation, saying it unfairly favours Chinese exporters.
It has also told Beijing to stop reclaiming land around islands and reefs which are claimed by multiple countries in the South China Sea, and has sent US Navy ships to the area. Both sides have accused each other of "militarising" the region.
Why is the South China Sea contentious?
Why China devalues the yuan
'Courtesy call'
Mr Trump's phone call with Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen was thought to be the first time a US leader or leader-in waiting has spoken to a Taiwanese leader since 1979, the year formal ties were severed.
The White House has said the phone call did not signal a shift in its decades-long "One China" policy stance, which considers Taiwan to be part of China.
Vice President-elect Mike Pence has tried to downplay the call.
In an interview with NBC News on Sunday, he said it was a "tempest in a teapot" and added: "I think I would just say to our counterparts in China that this was a moment of courtesy."
Trump-Taiwan call: Why China lodged its protest
Carrie Gracie: Trump's Taiwan call will stun Beijing
What's behind the China-Taiwan divide?
Beijing lodged a "solemn representation" with Washington, where it urged the US to "cautiously and properly handle" the issue of Taiwan, according to Chinese state media.
Taiwan sees itself as an independent state but Beijing considers it as a breakaway province.
It has hundreds of missiles pointing towards Taiwan, and has threatened to use force if Taiwan formally declares independence.
Suspected Russian warplanes bomb Idlib, dozens killed
At least 46 people have been killed in suspected Russian air strikes on several areas of Idlib province in northwest Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The Britain-based monitor said on Sunday at least three locations were bombed in the northwestern province and most of the casualties were civilians.
At least 26 civilians, including three children, were killed in the town of Kafr Nabal, and another 18 people were killed in the town of Maaret al-Numan.
A witness told AFP news agency "six strikes hit houses and a crowded local market" in the village of Kafr Nabal.
In Maaret al-Numan, an AFP photographer saw local residents and White Helmets rescue workers trying to reach survivors in the rubble at a vegetable market hit in the strike.
The monitor also reported two additional deaths, one in an earlier strike on Maaret al-Numan and another in Al-Naqir, also in Idlib.
And it said six civilians, four of them children, had been killed in a government barrel bomb attack on the town of Al-Tamanah in the south of Idlib.
Russia began a military intervention in support of President Bashar al-Assad in September last year, saying it was carrying out strikes against "terrorists".
In November, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said Russian forces had begun a "major operation" targeting Idlib and Homs provinces.
The northern Idlib province is mostly controlled by a powerful rebel alliance known as the Army of Conquest.
Most of Homs province is controlled by the Syrian government, but small parts of the countryside are controlled by a range of rebel groups.
More than 300,000 people have been killed in Syria since the conflict began in March 2011 with anti-government protests before spiralling into a bloody civil war.
Meanwhile, government forces continued to advance in the besieged city of Aleppo, pushing opposition forces out of several areas in the latest twist in the six-year-old conflict.
Syrian warplanes, artillery, and mortar rounds pounded opposition-held areas in eastern Aleppo on Saturday, killing at least three people, according to opposition activists.
Control of east Aleppo
Syrian state media reported government and allied troops were moving in on new neighbourhoods, pushing a kilometre deeper into the rebel-held enclave.
Syrian army spokesman Brigadier General Samir Suleiman said the military had regained control of 45 to 50 percent of east Aleppo, and he accused rebels of hiding among civilians.
The advances have caused massive displacement. The UN estimated more than 31,000 have already fled their homes, either to government or Kurdish areas, or deeper into the besieged enclave.
"We are told that around 50 percent of the rebel-held eastern Aleppo is now held by the government forces and its allies," Al Jazeera's Stefanie Dekker, reporting from Gaziantep on the Turkey-Syria border, said.
"This is the first time that we see this happening in four years. Aleppo has been in a stalemate between the government forces and rebels. Activists say that Aleppo is the heartland of this revolution and if they lose this city, they would lose their civilisation, they would lose everything."
The Britain-based monitor said on Sunday at least three locations were bombed in the northwestern province and most of the casualties were civilians.
At least 26 civilians, including three children, were killed in the town of Kafr Nabal, and another 18 people were killed in the town of Maaret al-Numan.
A witness told AFP news agency "six strikes hit houses and a crowded local market" in the village of Kafr Nabal.
In Maaret al-Numan, an AFP photographer saw local residents and White Helmets rescue workers trying to reach survivors in the rubble at a vegetable market hit in the strike.
The monitor also reported two additional deaths, one in an earlier strike on Maaret al-Numan and another in Al-Naqir, also in Idlib.
And it said six civilians, four of them children, had been killed in a government barrel bomb attack on the town of Al-Tamanah in the south of Idlib.
Russia began a military intervention in support of President Bashar al-Assad in September last year, saying it was carrying out strikes against "terrorists".
In November, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said Russian forces had begun a "major operation" targeting Idlib and Homs provinces.
The northern Idlib province is mostly controlled by a powerful rebel alliance known as the Army of Conquest.
Most of Homs province is controlled by the Syrian government, but small parts of the countryside are controlled by a range of rebel groups.
More than 300,000 people have been killed in Syria since the conflict began in March 2011 with anti-government protests before spiralling into a bloody civil war.
Meanwhile, government forces continued to advance in the besieged city of Aleppo, pushing opposition forces out of several areas in the latest twist in the six-year-old conflict.
Syrian warplanes, artillery, and mortar rounds pounded opposition-held areas in eastern Aleppo on Saturday, killing at least three people, according to opposition activists.
Control of east Aleppo
Syrian state media reported government and allied troops were moving in on new neighbourhoods, pushing a kilometre deeper into the rebel-held enclave.
Syrian army spokesman Brigadier General Samir Suleiman said the military had regained control of 45 to 50 percent of east Aleppo, and he accused rebels of hiding among civilians.
The advances have caused massive displacement. The UN estimated more than 31,000 have already fled their homes, either to government or Kurdish areas, or deeper into the besieged enclave.
"We are told that around 50 percent of the rebel-held eastern Aleppo is now held by the government forces and its allies," Al Jazeera's Stefanie Dekker, reporting from Gaziantep on the Turkey-Syria border, said.
"This is the first time that we see this happening in four years. Aleppo has been in a stalemate between the government forces and rebels. Activists say that Aleppo is the heartland of this revolution and if they lose this city, they would lose their civilisation, they would lose everything."
Last Tango In Paris rape scene confession sparks Hollywood backlash
Hollywood has condemned the director of the Last Tango in Paris after he admitted a rape scene was filmed without consent.
In a recently surfaced interview, Bernardo Bertolucci said he conspired with actor Marlon Brando to film a graphic rape scene without Maria Schneider knowing about it until shortly before filming it.
During the 2013 interview he said he "wanted her reaction as a girl, not as an actress".
"I wanted her to react humiliated," he said.
"I didn't want Maria to act her humiliation her rage, I wanted her to Maria to feel the rage and humiliation.
"Then she hated me for all of her life."
Actors have voiced their disgust at the admission on Twitter.
The Martian star Jessica Chastain tweeted: "To all the people that love this film - you're watching a 19yr old get raped by a 48yr old man. The director planned her attack. I feel sick."
Westworld actress Evan Rachel Wood, who recently revealed she has been raped twice, wrote in a post: "This is heartbreaking and outrageous. The 2 of them are very sick individuals to think that was OK."
Captain America lead Chris Evans tweeted: "Wow. I will never look at this film, Bertolucci or Brando the same way again. This is beyond disgusting. I feel rage."
Last Tango in Paris was made in 1972 and tells the story of a man who enters into an anonymous affair after his wife takes her own life.
It shocked audiences when it was released because of its explicit sex scenes and is still considered controversial.
In an interview with the Daily Mail newspaper in 2007, Ms Schneider said she had felt "humiliated" and "a little raped".
She also said was told about the nature of the scene shortly before it was shot, but it was not in the original script.
"I was so angry," she said.
"I should have called my agent or had my lawyer come to the set because you can't force someone to do something that isn't in the script, but at the time, I didn't know that."
Ms Schneider struggled with drug addiction and depression following the movie and died from cancer in 2011, aged 58.
Mr Bertolucci did admit he felt guilty about how he treated Ms Schneider, who was 19 at the time, but does not regret the scene.
In a recently surfaced interview, Bernardo Bertolucci said he conspired with actor Marlon Brando to film a graphic rape scene without Maria Schneider knowing about it until shortly before filming it.
During the 2013 interview he said he "wanted her reaction as a girl, not as an actress".
"I wanted her to react humiliated," he said.
"I didn't want Maria to act her humiliation her rage, I wanted her to Maria to feel the rage and humiliation.
"Then she hated me for all of her life."
Actors have voiced their disgust at the admission on Twitter.
The Martian star Jessica Chastain tweeted: "To all the people that love this film - you're watching a 19yr old get raped by a 48yr old man. The director planned her attack. I feel sick."
Westworld actress Evan Rachel Wood, who recently revealed she has been raped twice, wrote in a post: "This is heartbreaking and outrageous. The 2 of them are very sick individuals to think that was OK."
Captain America lead Chris Evans tweeted: "Wow. I will never look at this film, Bertolucci or Brando the same way again. This is beyond disgusting. I feel rage."
Last Tango in Paris was made in 1972 and tells the story of a man who enters into an anonymous affair after his wife takes her own life.
It shocked audiences when it was released because of its explicit sex scenes and is still considered controversial.
In an interview with the Daily Mail newspaper in 2007, Ms Schneider said she had felt "humiliated" and "a little raped".
She also said was told about the nature of the scene shortly before it was shot, but it was not in the original script.
"I was so angry," she said.
"I should have called my agent or had my lawyer come to the set because you can't force someone to do something that isn't in the script, but at the time, I didn't know that."
Ms Schneider struggled with drug addiction and depression following the movie and died from cancer in 2011, aged 58.
Mr Bertolucci did admit he felt guilty about how he treated Ms Schneider, who was 19 at the time, but does not regret the scene.
Aleppo cemeteries run out of room to bury victims of bloody conflict
Bodies are being left to rot on the streets or buried in backyards in the Syrian city of Aleppo because there is no room left in the cemeteries.
Officials said a graveyard opened last year was already full while the old cemetery had reached capacity even before the bloody civil war began four years ago.
Since the conflict has intensified, residents have had to resort to desperate measures to bury their dead.
Medical officials have said it is impossible to dig graves because it is too dangerous with Syrian troops attacking rebel-held areas.
They also said ambulances and rescue vehicles cannot reach people because they have been targeted or fuel has run out.
The head of the local forensic authority, Mohammed Abu Jaafar said: "We have no more room. I have 20 to 25 bodies from different parts of Aleppo that we don't know where to bury.
"Even if I were to consider mass burials, I don't have the machines to do the digging."
Residents of one neighbourhood only discovered a body was lying in a ditch when a cat started eating the corpse.
More than 300 people have been killed in the Damascus regime's assault on east Aleppo in the past three weeks, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Prior to the ground offensive, airstrikes knocked out all seven medical facilities, including five equipped with trauma and intensive care units.
It is understood doctors have set up small clinics underground to avoid detection, but are only able to give only basic care.
One nurse who works in one of the makeshift medical facilities said some wounded had died as they waited for treatment while others perished after surgery because of the cold weather.
There are also concerns the bodies piled up on roadsides will reveal the secret locations of the clinics.
Meanwhile, Syria's army has given rebel fighters an ultimatum to leave eastern Aleppo or face "inevitable death".
The warning came as government forces and its allies continue to advance on rebel-held areas.
Brigadier General Samir Suleiman said: "We will continue fighting until we restore stability and security to all neighbourhoods."
Residents have also started to go back to their abandoned homes as Syrian forces have recaptured half of the rebel areas in east Aleppo.
At least 10 buses made the trip from the west of the city to the east on Saturday with every seat and standing room taken.
"I haven't been to my house for almost six years," said Hala Hassan Fares, who was on one bus with her husband and son.
"Our house is totally burned, but we're going to see my father, who is 80-years-old.
"He stayed behind there, with my sisters and other relatives."
Many families arrived back home to a scene of devastation with rubble strewn streets and the fronts of buildings ripped away.
Officials said a graveyard opened last year was already full while the old cemetery had reached capacity even before the bloody civil war began four years ago.
Since the conflict has intensified, residents have had to resort to desperate measures to bury their dead.
Medical officials have said it is impossible to dig graves because it is too dangerous with Syrian troops attacking rebel-held areas.
They also said ambulances and rescue vehicles cannot reach people because they have been targeted or fuel has run out.
The head of the local forensic authority, Mohammed Abu Jaafar said: "We have no more room. I have 20 to 25 bodies from different parts of Aleppo that we don't know where to bury.
"Even if I were to consider mass burials, I don't have the machines to do the digging."
Residents of one neighbourhood only discovered a body was lying in a ditch when a cat started eating the corpse.
More than 300 people have been killed in the Damascus regime's assault on east Aleppo in the past three weeks, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Prior to the ground offensive, airstrikes knocked out all seven medical facilities, including five equipped with trauma and intensive care units.
It is understood doctors have set up small clinics underground to avoid detection, but are only able to give only basic care.
One nurse who works in one of the makeshift medical facilities said some wounded had died as they waited for treatment while others perished after surgery because of the cold weather.
There are also concerns the bodies piled up on roadsides will reveal the secret locations of the clinics.
Meanwhile, Syria's army has given rebel fighters an ultimatum to leave eastern Aleppo or face "inevitable death".
The warning came as government forces and its allies continue to advance on rebel-held areas.
Brigadier General Samir Suleiman said: "We will continue fighting until we restore stability and security to all neighbourhoods."
Residents have also started to go back to their abandoned homes as Syrian forces have recaptured half of the rebel areas in east Aleppo.
At least 10 buses made the trip from the west of the city to the east on Saturday with every seat and standing room taken.
"I haven't been to my house for almost six years," said Hala Hassan Fares, who was on one bus with her husband and son.
"Our house is totally burned, but we're going to see my father, who is 80-years-old.
"He stayed behind there, with my sisters and other relatives."
Many families arrived back home to a scene of devastation with rubble strewn streets and the fronts of buildings ripped away.
Trust in politicians 'approaching rock bottom', survey finds
Trust in politicians is “approaching rock bottom” as just 15% of the public believe they can be depended on to tell the truth, a poll has found.
Politicians were ranked as the least trustworthy professionals in the annual Ipsos Mori "veracity" survey, sinking a further 6% over the year that brought the Brexit vote.
At the other end of the trust scale, nurses topped the index with the backing of 93% of respondents - ahead of doctors, teachers and judges.
The report authors said the drop in trust for politicians would have been "surprising" had it not been for the EU referendum.
They said: "2016 is, of course, some way away from being a normal year, and voters' levels of trust in mainstream politicians seem to be approaching rock bottom."
The report added: "One rare point of agreement between Leave and Remain voters is that neither of the campaigns covered themselves in glory; between them they demonstrated most of the characteristics that turn voters off.
"Politicians in Westminster in particular have much work to do to start reconnecting with voters and demonstrating that they have priorities other than getting their own viewpoints across and ignoring debate."
According to the index, which polled 1,019 adults between October and November, government ministers, journalists and estate agents are also among the least trustworthy professionals.
Trust in lawyers, priests and the police has climbed, while pollsters fell two places in the index.
Most trusted professions (% of people who trust them to tell the truth)
:: Nurses (93%)
:: Doctors (91%)
:: Teachers (88%)
:: Judges (81%)
:: Scientists (80%)
Least trusted professions (% of people who trust them to tell the truth)
:: Business leaders (33%)
:: Estate agents (30%)
:: Journalists (24%)
:: Government ministers (20%)
:: Politicians (15%)
Politicians were ranked as the least trustworthy professionals in the annual Ipsos Mori "veracity" survey, sinking a further 6% over the year that brought the Brexit vote.
At the other end of the trust scale, nurses topped the index with the backing of 93% of respondents - ahead of doctors, teachers and judges.
The report authors said the drop in trust for politicians would have been "surprising" had it not been for the EU referendum.
They said: "2016 is, of course, some way away from being a normal year, and voters' levels of trust in mainstream politicians seem to be approaching rock bottom."
The report added: "One rare point of agreement between Leave and Remain voters is that neither of the campaigns covered themselves in glory; between them they demonstrated most of the characteristics that turn voters off.
"Politicians in Westminster in particular have much work to do to start reconnecting with voters and demonstrating that they have priorities other than getting their own viewpoints across and ignoring debate."
According to the index, which polled 1,019 adults between October and November, government ministers, journalists and estate agents are also among the least trustworthy professionals.
Trust in lawyers, priests and the police has climbed, while pollsters fell two places in the index.
Most trusted professions (% of people who trust them to tell the truth)
:: Nurses (93%)
:: Doctors (91%)
:: Teachers (88%)
:: Judges (81%)
:: Scientists (80%)
Least trusted professions (% of people who trust them to tell the truth)
:: Business leaders (33%)
:: Estate agents (30%)
:: Journalists (24%)
:: Government ministers (20%)
:: Politicians (15%)
Green Party switches strategy in Pennsylvania recount
Hours after a Green Party-backed campaign dropped its case in state courts they announce a change to their strategy to force a statewide recount of Pennsylvania's Nov. 8 presidential election, won by Republican Donald Trump, and said late Saturday night that it will seek help in the federal courts, rather than the state courts.
The campaign announced that it would seek an emergency federal court order on Monday for a recount.
"Make no mistake — the Stein campaign will continue to fight for a statewide recount in Pennsylvania," recount campaign lawyer Jonathan Abady said in a statement issued a little before midnight. "We are committed to this fight to protect the civil and voting rights of all Americans."
Abady said barriers to a recount in Pennsylvania are pervasive and the state court system is ill-equipped to address the problem.
Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein, raised over $6.9 million to fund recount efforts in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Stein framed the issue as an effort to explore whether voting machines and systems had been hacked and the election result manipulated. Despite Stein's lawyers having offered no evidence of hacking in Pennsylvania's election.
The state Republican Party and Trump asked for a dismissal in the state court case.
The decision came two days before a state court hearing was scheduled in the case. Saturday's court filing to withdraw the case said the Green Party-backed voters who filed it "are regular citizens of ordinary means" and cannot afford the $1 million bond ordered by the court by 5 p.m. Monday. Green Party-backed efforts to force recounts and analyze election software in scattered precincts were continuing. The court's order can be read here.
The Wisconsin recount began on Thursday, while a potential recount could begin in Michigan next week.
No Republican presidential candidate had captured Pennsylvania since 1988.
Stein announced Pennsylvania's recount purpose was to ensure "our votes are safe and secure."
They have unsuccessfully sought to get various counties to allow a forensic examination of their election system software.
Trump’s lawyers and the state Republican Party claimed there was no evidence or allegations that tampering occurred with Pennsylvania's voting systems. Pennsylvania law does not allow a court-ordered recount, they argued, and a lawyer for the Green Party had acknowledged that the effort was without precedent in Pennsylvania.
Republican lawyers also argued that the case has threatened the state’s ability to certify its presidential electors by the December 13 federal deadline.
On Saturday, a GOP lawyer, Lawrence Tabas, said the case had been meant "solely for purposes to delay the Electoral College vote in Pennsylvania for President-Elect Trump."
The state's top elections official, Secretary of State Pedro Cortes, a Democrat, has said there was no evidence of any sort of cyberattacks or irregularities in the election. Cortes predicted that a recount would change few votes.
As of Friday, Trump's margin of victory in Pennsylvania was 49,000, or less than 1 percent, out of 6 million votes cast, according to state election officials. State and county officials did not expect any outstanding uncounted votes to change the outcome of the presidential election in Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania's automatic statewide recount trigger is 0.5 percent. Stein drew less than 1 percent of the votes cast.
Cuba begins Fidel Castro's private burial
Fidel Castro's ashes were taken on Sunday to a cemetery in the southeastern city of Santiago - the cradle of the Cuban revolution - for funeral with the military firing a 21-gun salute for their fallen leader.
The remains of the man who ruled Cuba for a half-century left the Plaza of the Revolution in the eastern city at 6:39am local time, more than 20 minutes ahead of their scheduled departure. The funeral caravan entered the cemetery at 7:12am local time.
Thousands of people lined the two-mile route to Santa Ifigenia cemetery, waving Cuban flags and shouting "Long live Fidel!"
The funeral was closed to the public and no images of the tomb have been released so far.
Castro, who died on November 25 at age 90, is being laid to rest during a "simple" ceremony near the mausoleum of 19th century independence icon Jose Marti and other national heroes.
After two days of events in Havana, Castro's funeral cortege departed on a three-day, 800km journey east, retracing the route that the triumphant rebels took upon overthrowing US-backed Fulgencio Batista in 1959.
On Saturday evening, President Raul Castro, his brother and successor, said "millions" had come out to pay tribute.
Crowds have greeted the caravan along the whole route, with volunteers sprucing up bridges and houses
With his brother at his side, Castro began his revolution on July 26, 1953, with a failed assault on the Moncada barracks in Santiago.
He went on to build a Soviet-sponsored communist state 145km from the United States and survived a half century of US attempts to topple or kill him.
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